What is "Grunge"? Really.

Like the topic says.

Don't give me bands. So-called "grunge" bands Nirvana, AIC, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam all sound drastically different. Give me a description.

Couldnt tell you, I never understood the tag either, I always thought of it as alternative.

It was a marketing term, plain and simple. Short, catchy and memorable. The music industry needed something to call this "new" movement.

I have always felt that it was more of a movement than a style/ genre. It was a way for record execs., disc jockeys, and media persons to categorize the Seattle scene/ sound that was not easily compartmentalized into either hair metal/ heavy metal/ hard rock. Even those tags are not completely foolproof as we have discussed on this board before that not everyone is categorized easily as their early albums may be heavier than their newer ones. See the Def Leppard threads for more info. I have always thought they came up with the word grunge as a response to the look of the artists at the forefront of this movement and the downtuned sludgy sound of the music. I think they should have called it "flannel rock" LOL. Peace.

I never liked the term or understood what it really meant. My net of what I consider metal is very wide and during that time alot of the bands mentioned (Nirvana, Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Pearl Jame etc) were labeled heavy metal or in magazines such as Kerrang alternative metal.

Suddenly the word grunge came into vogue to describe any band that busted out of Seattle in the wake of the success of 'Nevermind'

Dictionary.com tells us this:

A style of rock music that incorporates elements of punk rock and heavy metal, popularized in the early 1990s and often marked by lyrics exhibiting nihilism, dissatisfaction, or apathy.

Eh, works for me, I guess. It's like asking someone to define pornography. I can't tell you what is pornographic, but I knows it when I sees it. Same with grunge. I can't tell you what it is, but I know it when I hear it.

I don't know about the others but AIC was a heavy rock/metal band.

Lumping these bands (Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, etc) into the same category is ludicrous anyway. Aside from the fact they all came out of Seattle there really isn't a unified theme behind these groups.

Soundgarden had more in common with bands like Kyuss than they did the other Seattle groups. I remember an interview with Cornell where they asked him what is influences were and he said "Black Sabbath, Black Sabbath and Black Sabbath". Of course that's a simplification, but it fits.

Alice In Chains was HEAVILY influenced by King's X. Drop-D tuning, vocal harmonies, etc. Cantrell was a Ty Tabor nut and was once quoted in a guitar magazine: "I love it when a new King's X record comes out because there's more riffs I can cop"...of course he was being humorous but the similarity is there. Listen to Them Bones for a good example...

Pearl Jam was also a completely different animal, they didn't de-tune their guitars, they were much "artier" than the other Seattle groups...a completely different sound.

But, it was easier for the media to create a "mold" they could fit them into.

detuned wrote:

Lumping these bands (Alice In Chains, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, etc) into the same category is ludicrous anyway. Aside from the fact they all came out of Seattle there really isn't a unified theme behind these groups.

Soundgarden had more in common with bands like Kyuss than they did the other Seattle groups. I remember an interview with Cornell where they asked him what is influences were and he said "Black Sabbath, Black Sabbath and Black Sabbath". Of course that's a simplification, but it fits.

Alice In Chains was HEAVILY influenced by King's X. Drop-D tuning, vocal harmonies, etc. Cantrell was a Ty Tabor nut and was once quoted in a guitar magazine: "I love it when a new King's X record comes out because there's more riffs I can cop"...of course he was being humorous but the similarity is there. Listen to Them Bones for a good example...

Pearl Jam was also a completely different animal, they didn't de-tune their guitars, they were much "artier" than the other Seattle groups...a completely different sound.

But, it was easier for the media to create a "mold" they could fit them into.

Alice also had a big Sabbath influence along with King's X.

simply grunge = shi* it had to die and it is dead. take a look at shows. no one want to see PL, AIC etc. see how many fans are on GlamHair Hard pop metal/rock ... shows.
grunge were only 5 yrs top than, when KiSS, Sabbath and other big 70s bands make reunion shows they left stage and till that days are g o n e forever.

Grunge is dead as Punk.

The point I was trying to make was that as a musical "style", grunge never really existed...it was just a marketing term made up by record labels.

Grunge to me is a style that is basically not heavy enough to be metal and not soft enough to be alternative.

iamrockerfun wrote:

simply grunge = shi* it had to die and it is dead. take a look at shows. no one want to see PL, AIC etc. see how many fans are on GlamHair Hard pop metal/rock ... shows.
grunge were only 5 yrs top than, when KiSS, Sabbath and other big 70s bands make reunion shows they left stage and till that days are g o n e forever.

Grunge is dead as Punk.

Wrong!!!! Pearl Jam's albums still sell and both Nirvana and AIC's back catalog continues to sell. Also Pearl Jam headline arenas all over the world.

Downtuned alt-rock.

MetalGuy71 wrote:

Eh, works for me, I guess. It's like asking someone to define pornography. I can't tell you what is pornographic, but I knows it when I sees it.

Pictures and videos with naked people

EvyMetal wrote:

MetalGuy71 wrote:

Eh, works for me, I guess. It's like asking someone to define pornography. I can't tell you what is pornographic, but I knows it when I sees it.

Pictures and videos with naked people

Actually pornography is literally defined by what you get off on. If waffles give you a boner--and who doesn't get a boner over waffles?--then waffles are pornographic.

Eyesore wrote:

Actually pornography is literally defined by what you get off on. If waffles give you a boner--and who doesn't get a boner over waffles?--then waffles are pornographic.

My hamster gets boners from staring at jellyfish.

I've never understood the "grunge" tag either.

Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Alice In Chains, Mother Love Bone, Screaming Trees, Tad?

Those bands don't sound alike at all.

I think the "grunge" tag was derived more from where your band was from than what the band sounded like.

tohostudios wrote:

I've never understood the "grunge" tag either.

Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Alice In Chains, Mother Love Bone, Screaming Trees, Tad?

Those bands don't sound alike at all.

I think the "grunge" tag was derived more from where your band was from than what the band sounded like.

The same goes for nu-metal. They simply define an era. I'm cool with that, really.

Eyesore wrote:

Downtuned alt-rock.

Not sure if that works in a literal sense or not. That basically describes the sound of Tool, Helmet and a ton of other groups that had no ties to the supposed "grunge" scene.

There was a great joke running around Seattle though during the 90's, it basically said they needed to change the town limits signs to say:

Welcome to Seattle, please tune down to D

Wasn't "Grunge" just the name given to Nirvana, AIC, Pearl Jam, and STP before the label "Alternative" existed?? Once the term "Alternative" started to be used to refer to the new sound of rock which began with aforesaid bands, I remember not hearing the term "Grunge" anymore. Thinking back to 1993, when Pearl Jam was a new and very popular band among us college dudes, I don't remember hearing the label "Alternative" yet. I remember hearing the label "Alternative" in 1994, though, to describe new bands such as The Offspring or Green Day.

Most genres are like this. Just think about any given genre, and I'll show you two bands that are quite opposite of eachother, but still are lumpred into the same category/genre.

kmorg wrote:

Most genres are like this. Just think about any given genre, and I'll show you two bands that are quite opposite of eachother, but still are lumpred into the same category/genre.

Exactly. If VH-1 were to do a list of the Top 100 Hair Bands, you can bet your bottom dollar that they'd lump Queensryche in with Poison, even though most, if not all of us here, would know that the 2 bands are vastly different. It's just coincidence that they both came to prominence in the 80's and had long hair.

VH1 can barely distinguish between Alice Cooper and Alice In Chains let alone genres.

EvyMetal wrote:

MetalGuy71 wrote:

Eh, works for me, I guess. It's like asking someone to define pornography. I can't tell you what is pornographic, but I knows it when I sees it.

Pictures and videos with naked people

So by your definition, this is pornography...



...and not a work of art?